


Rearrange

by jemdetta



Category: Arctic Monkeys, Last Shadow Puppets
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Costume Parties & Masquerades, Fluff, Halloween, M/M, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-04
Updated: 2020-06-04
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:20:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24540712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jemdetta/pseuds/jemdetta
Summary: Alex and Matt hold their yearly Halloween party. There are ghost cookies, fantastic costumes and embarrassing public confessions of love.
Relationships: Miles Kane/Alex Turner
Comments: 10
Kudos: 46





	Rearrange

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lazorjam](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lazorjam/gifts).



> A happy birthday to the very wonderful [lazorjam](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lazorjam/pseuds/lazorjam) who wrote me [a wonderful high-school Milex AU](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24479416) because she is lovely like that. In turn, I tried to write her something too. Hope you have a fantastic birthday!

4.07pm

The doorbell rang when Alex was just getting out of the shower. He rubbed the towel against his damp legs, fumbling for his phone and glancing incredulously at the time. The party wouldn’t be for hours yet. He yelled for Matt to get the door, but there was only silence. Matt must have gone out at some point to get more supplies. Alex huffed in annoyance. Who could it be at this early hour?

“Just a minute!” Alex called out, as the doorbell rings turned to impatient knocks on the door. He grabbed the nearest thing - his Wu-Tang Clan boxing shorts - and made himself decent, stumbling to the door while towelling his hair dry. He didn’t care what his mystery guest would think of his attire; if they hadn’t wanted an eyeful, then maybe they should have thought twice before turning up three hours early for a party.

When he finally swung open the door, his uncharitable mood was quickly replaced with delight at the sight of Miles waiting for him on the porch with a wide grin. “Bloody hell, should’ve known it was you,” Alex pretended to grumble, even as Miles laughed and playfully shoved him aside. “Were you trying to drill a hole in the doorbell?”

“Don’t pretend you’re not overjoyed to see me,” Miles declared, which earned him an eye-roll from Alex. “Where’s our Matt?”

“Fucked off to Asda for more stuff, I reckon.” Alex slung the towel around his neck as he checked his messages, finding one which confirmed that Matt had, indeed, fucked off to Asda. “What brings you around at this hour then, Kane?”

Miles pulled a face at him. “One would think you weren’t secretly happy to see me, Al.”

“One would be right,” Alex muttered as he tossed the towel into the nearby laundry hamper. He was only aware he wasn’t wearing a shirt when he sensed Miles’ gaze skittering down his chest. “Stop staring, you tosser, I know I’m skinny.”

“What the hell are you wearing?” Miles cried, and Alex groaned when he remembered the Wu-Tang shorts. “Are you going in costume as the most hideously unattractive bloke alive? Because if so, you succeeded.”

“Shut it, will you?” Still, Alex couldn’t help smiling as he went to dig out more suitable clothes. Miles appeared to be slightly mollified once Alex reappeared in jeans and his ‘I Like Big Bots and I Cannot Lie’ t-shirt. “Anyway, I’m serious. I thought we stated in the group chat that the party would only get started around sevenish. Why so early?”

To his surprise, Miles ducked his head, uncharacteristically shy for once. “Thought it might have been fun to get our costumes ready together, y’know?” he said with a deceptively nonchalant shrug. This immediately tipped Alex off that there was something strange going on with Miles, something he had up his sleeve that Alex couldn’t quite put his finger on. Alex narrowed his eyes at his friend, trying his best to read the stiff, unnatural lines of his awkward posture.

Then it came to him: Miles was _nervous_.

“You alright?” Alex placed a hand on his shoulder, surprised when Miles flinched slightly before relaxing into the contact. There was something really odd about Miles today.

“Yeah, don’t be silly.” Whatever it was, Miles had shaken off his funk and was back to his normal bright, spirited self. He dropped his satchel onto Alex’s desk, distracted by the acoustic guitar perched at the side of the bed as he ran his fingers over it . “So you decided on your costume yet?”

Now this was more familiar ground. Every year, Alex and Miles would put their heads together and come up with ideas for Halloween costumes that would knock everyone else’s out of the water. However, Miles had insisted on doing his own thing this time around, which had stung a little but Alex had shrugged it off. It wasn’t often that both of them were single and therefore not part of a couple's costume with their girlfriends, but for some reason Miles was being a mysterious prat about it this year. So after some searching, Alex had settled on an off-brand Iron Man costume that Jamie had dug out from the dusty bowels of the charity shop near campus.

“Yeah, I’ve got some ideas.” Alex tried to crane his neck to get a glimpse of whatever Miles was holding. “You?”

Miles narrowed his eyes at Alex. “You go first.”

“No, you.” Alex raised an eyebrow in challenge.

“I asked first, you twat.”

Alex sighed heavily, giving up before Miles completely drove him up the wall. “Alright, alright.” Still a little petulant with Miles for being so annoyingly evasive, Alex decided he wasn’t going to tell Miles anything either, not when Miles was keeping secrets from him. “I’m going as a ghost this year.”

Miles’ eyebrows shot up. “Really?”

“Yeah, really.”

“Like, a proper ghost?” Miles pointed at Alex’s bed. “With sheets and the like?”

Alan just nodded, deciding the lie would be more believable with less details. “Sheets and the like.”

Miles almost looked disappointed. “Didn’t peg you as being so _pedestrian_ , Turner.”

“Maybe if you hadn’t been such a git about not sharing costume ideas, I might have done better,” Alex muttered, although he’d instantly regretted the dig once he spotted the shadow of guilt that crossed Miles’ face.

The sound of the door banging open and Matt’s loud greeting jolted Alex out of his thoughts, and he mentally tucked away that odd moment earlier with Miles into some far corner of his brain as both of them ran to help Matt with the party supplies from Asda. After all, they had a so-called legendary party to prep for.

11.46pm

The loud jangly guitar riffs of the Fratellis rattled through the house, floating over the noise and chatter of a party in full swing. Alex was doing his best to play the good host, topping up the various bowls of crisps and pointing partygoers towards the impromptu bar in the kitchen. Someone had even baked special Halloween-themed cookies for their party, and Alex helped himself to a ghost-shaped one. There were so many people that the party had spilled out into the back and front gardens, people sitting on the grass and laughing and drinking.

Alex knew one of the main reasons everyone liked to attend his and Matt’s parties was the location of their rented house, which was right down the road at the end of a cul-de-sac. It was a bit far from the nearest bus stop, but it also meant no irate neighbours who were happy to ring up the police with noise complaints. It also helped that Matt was one of the biggest social butterflies on campus, and everyone knew and loved the bloke. In comparison, Alex kept a low profile and preferred the company of a few close friends, Miles in particular.

On paper, he and Miles would not have worked as best mates. Miles was flashy, loud, gregarious and the life of every party he went to. Alex preferred to stick with his mates in a corner and people-watch. But somehow, they worked, ever since they’d met on the first day of student orientation and gasped at each other’s Scott Walker t-shirts. Alex had other friends from other classes, other modules, other social groups. But Miles was special in a way that Alex couldn’t quite describe.

Alex was stirred out of his thoughts when someone in a Beetlejuice costume came up to him to say hello. Still, Alex couldn’t help keeping an eye out for Miles, who was mysteriously nowhere to be found ever since the party had started. He still didn’t know what costume Miles was supposed to be wearing, and it grated on his nerves again that Miles’ secrecy still stung. For three years, they’d _never_ kept secrets from each other and had hauled each other through break-ups, exams, family troubles and fights with other mates. No one knew Alex more than Miles, and it bothered him that Miles was trying to keep him out.

If Alex wanted to be honest with himself, it wasn’t just the costume thing that was the problem. No, Miles had already been becoming progressively evasive and secretive for a few months now. If he were scribbling in his notebooks, he’d quickly shut them whenever Alex came along. He would constantly snap photos of Alex but refuse to let Alex even have a glance at his gallery. He would play moody, depressing love songs whenever they studied together, lost in thought before Alex would snap him out of it. Alex had never seen this side of him before, and he didn’t want to admit that it profoundly worried him. He didn’t know what he would do if he lost Miles’ friendship. The alternative didn’t bear thinking about.

“Hey Al.” It was Matt, who was sweating in his Trump costume. “Could I borrow your guitar?”

“Go ahead.” Alex nodded towards his room. “Just don’t throw up on it.”

Alex was in the middle of stocking the fridge with more beer and mixers when Matt came up to him again, frowning. “It isn’t there, Al.”

“What?” They quickly ran back to his room, but Matt was right. Alex’s guitar was missing from its perch beside his bed. “Fuckin’ hell, if I find out who took it--”

There was a sharp knock on the door as Andy poked his head in. “You lads have got to come and see this,” he said, urgently beckoning them outside.

“Not now, mate, Al’s guitar is missing,” Matt said with a frown, brushing back the orange fluff on top of his hair.

“No, that’s what I’m saying, the guitar is with Miles.” Andy looked extremely amused. “He’s using it to bloody serenade someone in the garden.”

Alex and Matt exchanged odd looks before they pushed their way outside, past a drunk Theresa May and a group of glittery vampires. There was a small circle of people standing in the garden, all of them watching as Miles - finally!- stood in the middle of the crowd in a very smart suit and tie, strumming Alex’s guitar as he sang along to something really familiar. It only took Alex a few seconds to recognise the tune, one of Miles’ own songs that he’d penned a few months ago - Alex had even helped with the chorus. The riff had been memorable enough that it had stuck in his head ever since.

Then again, Alex always remembered all of Miles’ songs.

_Magic from your fingers tingles down my spine,_  
_Colour in between the lines,_  
_Let it out, let it out, let it all out._

The crowd was nodding along, charmed by the music but mystified and curious as to what Miles was up to. But they didn’t have to wait long; Miles was walking up to someone dressed in a ghost costume, singing the lyrics tenderly to them as though they were the only person in the world. Alex was stunned by the violent surge of jealousy that gripped his heart, making him irrationally angry and upset and wanting to shove that ghost person far, far away from Miles. His Miles.

“What the bloody hell is Kane doing?” Matt wondered out loud.

“Who knows with that nutter?” Andy scoffed. “Maybe it’s another one of his stunts.”

Someone in the house had turned off the music so it was only Mile’s strong tenor and Alex’s guitar filling the air. People were already holding their phones aloft to record it all, giggling but waiting to see what would happen. For one thing, nobody knew who the person in the ghost costume was and they were presumably waiting for the great reveal. It was hard to suss out who it was, with the thick bed-sheet and its crudely cut eye-holes. Alex couldn’t even tell if it was a girl or a bloke.

Once the song was done, everyone clapped and whistled as Miles carefully set down the guitar and smiled at the person in the ghost costume. “So what do you think?” he asked, his face flushed red with what looked like nervousness and embarrassment.

“Snog him!” someone shouted, which made the crowd laugh. But it wasn’t long before people started taking up the chant, vampires and werewolves and politicians and celebrities all shouting, _snog him, snog him_ before the ‘ghost’ finally relented and started grappling with the sheet to reveal their identity. Alex almost tripped over Matt’s feet to get a better look for himself, heartsick with irrational anger and jealousy.

Everyone gasped when the bedsheet came off and it was just Jamie, blinking owlishly at a stunned Miles. “Er, thanks for the song, mate,” Jamie said awkwardly. “Mind if we skip the snog and go for a handshake instead?”

Miles mouthed something that looked like ‘Alex’ and muttered his apologies to Jamie, who shrugged it off with relative ease. Now that it was a case of mistaken identity, people were returning to their drinks and chatter, and someone resumed the loud music. Miles had stalked off somewhere, but Alex didn’t know where he had gone.

“This is the last time we serve absinthe at our Halloween dos,” Matt declared firmly, but Alex was already walking away to search for Miles.

4.34am

Alex carried out the last of the empty beer bottles to the recyclable bin outside, glancing down in distaste at how much everyone had drunk. He went back inside the house to do a last round of cleaning, trying to keep his mind off the fact that Miles seemed to have disappeared into the night, and was refusing to answer his calls or texts. Matt had suspected that something was wrong and advised Alex to let Miles clear his head.

But Alex couldn’t forget the look of shocked betrayal on Miles’ face when Jamie had pulled off the sheet, the way he’d mouthed ‘Alex’ before fucking off to God knew where. Was it all an elaborate prank? One of those public spectacles that Miles was always so fond of?

As he gloomily wandered into his room for a quick check, he spotted the Wu-Tang shorts draped over the back of his chair. Then his stomach plummeted.

Miles had asked insistently for his costume. And Alex had told him that he was going as a fucking ghost.

As if on cue, the doorbell rang insistently again. “Fucking go home!” Matt shouted from inside his room, probably thinking it was some wayward drunk reluctant to leave the party. But something was telling Alex to answer the door anyway.

Taking a deep breath for courage, Alex had no idea why he was so nervous about opening the bloody door. The bell rang again, so he reached for the doorknob and turned it.

A bedraggled, drunk Miles was leaning against the door jamb, his tie askew and his hair mussed. He stared at Alex with an air of...expectancy? Wonder?

“You lied to me.” Miles didn’t sound angry. “You said you were going as a ghost.”

“Yeah, well.” Alex took in a shaky breath. Miles looked wild and unhappy and-- _beautiful_ , if Alex wanted to truly be honest with himself. “I was tired of you hiding things from me.”

Miles blinked, his gaze dropping with the heavy weight of guilt. “I didn’t mean to.” He looked so small and uncertain of his place in Alex’s life.

“Just to be clear,” Alex kept his voice stern. “I weren’t talking about the bloody costumes.”

Miles cleared his throat. “Neither was I.”

They stood there for a long moment before Alex stepped aside, letting Miles shuffle in from the cold. It was a little too late - or early? - for tea, so Alex fetched both of them some leftover beer and they made themselves comfortable on the sofa. Miles drank his in one go.

“That were a good song though,” Alex finally said, peeling the label of his beer bottle. “It were that ‘Rearrange’ one, right?”

Miles nodded, looking both surprised and pleased. “How’s Jamie?”

“Scarred but he’ll survive.” Alex shot Miles the most exasperatedly fond look he could muster. “Did you never think about taking the sheet off?”

“You said that was your costume!” Miles protested.

“I was Iron Man.”

“That might be even more pedestrian than the ghost one,” Miles muttered, smiling when Alex nudged him.

They sat in silence, their legs jiggling up and down with nervousness. Finally, Alex mustered all the courage he had - all the courage Miles had ever taught him to harness - and shifted closer, lifting his arm. Miles only hesitated for a second before slipping under it, sighing as Alex pulled him closer.

“So would you consider it a failure?” Miles asked quietly, tracing a pattern on Alex’s chest. “Or a success?”

Alex pretended to mull it over, his fingers brushing over the soft warmth of Miles’ nape. “The song? Or the gesture?”

Miles let out his trademark cheeky cackle. “Both, I guess?”

“Song was bloody great. The gesture was a bit rubbish,” Alex said, smirking as Miles flicked his nose. “There’s really nowt wrong with asking someone out for a cup of coffee, y’know. And just telling them how you feel.”

“Maybe that’s what grand gestures are for,” Miles said, his voice getting softer and softer. “Easy to hide behind them when you’re terrified of telling your best mate you’re in love with them.”

Alex closed his eyes, letting the words sink in. It all made sense to him now, the past few months of secrecy and nervousness and Miles’ odd behaviour. He’d even remembered Miles’ eyes lingering on him when they’d been writing ‘Rearrange’, never thinking it was odd. Miles had always been watching him, after all.

“Then stop hiding, especially when it's pretty bloody obvious they feel the same way,” Alex murmured, opening his eyes as he turned to face Miles. Beautiful, silly, gregarious Miles, with his soft brown hair and his soft brown eyes. Alex took hold of his crooked tie and tugged him closer, kissing him gently. It only took Miles a moment to kiss back, opening up to him with a smile.


End file.
